The man pictured above is Dr Peter May, a retired Christian GP who features in a ‘gay-to-straight’ film that was banned this week by a London cinema.
May, a member of the Anglican General Synod between 1985 and 2010, is among a number of “experts” who appear in a film entitled Voices of the Silenced: Experts, Evidences and Ideologies which was dropped suddenly by the Vue Cinema at London’s Piccadilly Circus after being “bullied” by gay activists.
Now, according to this report, the Christian Legal Centre, headed by Andrea Minichiello Williams, is threatening to go to the High Court for an injunction, or take legal action against Vue under the Equality Act 2010.
Vue dropped the film after PinkNews blasted Core Issues Trust film, made to show that people can change their sexual orientation. It quoted Humanists UK Director of Public Affairs and Policy Richy Thompson as saying:

The association between so-called ‘conversion therapy’ and negative mental health outcomes for gay and bisexual people is strong.These are harmful religious ‘therapies’ rooted in homophobia, not science. The Government has a duty to end these harmful practices once and for all.Young people struggling with their sexuality deserve support to live confident, authentic lives without being made to feel shame due to outdated religious views about sin and sexuality.

Williams, above, said:

Ironically, the actions of PinkNews and Vue cinema illustrate the point of the film. The Voices of the Silenced are, in fact, being silenced.This is fundamentally a free speech issue. As usual, a minority of gay activists use threats and intimidation to shut down any opposing views. Tragically, they can’t tolerate the truth that there are significant numbers of men and women who have no wish to remain in a gay lifestyle and seek help to leave it.

Core Issues Trust, a Christian group that “helps people who experience unwanted same-sex attraction”, had arranged for the film to be screened tonight (Thursday) at 7:00 pm.Dr Mike Davidson prattling on in his ridiculous movie. You can watch the trailer here.
But the cinema sent Dr Mike Davidson, the head of CIT, an email telling him that the screening had been cancelled. He whined in his irritating South African voice:

This is a very important film raising public awareness about difficult issues faced by a whole category of vulnerable people, and we are very disappointed that the screening has been cancelled at the last moment.

Voices of the Silenced was filmed over two years in eight countries. People from all around the world were scheduled to attend its premiere.
The film interviews 15 people “who left the homosexual lifestyle”. Christian Concern, which is linked to the Christian Legal Centre, said in a press release:

It challenges the closedown of the debate about the value of therapeutic support to these people in ways that are respectful of clients and individual rights to change.

Soooo … how would the likes of Davidson deal with someone who experiences unwanted heterosexual feelings? Watch this brilliant video:?Hat tip: AgentCormac and BarrieJohn

Lets just note down those 15 ‘converts’ and see how long before they collapse in misery.

Angela_K

If shit for brains Williams claims to be a lawyer, perhaps she should re-examine the equality laws because it does not cover her and her fellow loonies claim of discrimination.

Broga

These inadequate and insecure fools are a disgrace to themselves and anyone associating with them. They attract the usual suspects who turn up and present themselves for another legal kicking.

AgentCormac

‘The Voices of the Silenced are, in fact, being silenced.’
Erm… does that actually make any sense? How can something that’s been silenced be silenced? No wonder Williams manages to lose 99.9% of her cases with logic like that.

StephenJP

I am not gay; but I really struggle to understand how being homosexual can possibly be regarded as a ‘lifestyle choice’ that people can just walk away from if they choose. The whole premise of this film seems to me to be slanted and dishonest.
Just think of the film that could be made about people who have come out as gay: proud, liberated, or even just relieved! There would be no end to it!
I have probably said this before, but I am damned if I know where the CLC get the money from to fund their unfailingly unsuccessful legal actions. Who is Andrea’s sugar-daddy? I really think we should be told.

barriejohn

Dr Peter May hails from my neck of the woods, and, surprise, surprise, is an active member of the Christian Medical Fellowship. If you want some idea of how deluded the poor fellow is, just wade through some of this pseudoscientific drivel:https://www.cmf.org.uk/resources/publications/content/?context=article&id=26708Did Synod rise to this challenge? Did anyone point out the well-documented, serious health risks associated with homosexual behaviour that might motivate a desire for change? No, they did not, yet they amount to very good reasons why people might want to move away from homosexual desires and behaviours. For instance, while there are in UK almost as many cases of HIV in the heterosexual population, the LGBT community is only around 2% of the population. This means that HIV incidence is about 40 times more common among gay men overall and is higher still among adolescents. Similar risks attach to syphilis and gonorrhoea. Add to these the well documented, increased incidence of anxiety, depression, suicide, loneliness and drug and alcohol addictions in the LGBT community, banning therapy for those who request it, without good scientific reasons, is surely a denial of their basic human rights.
No wonder gay people get depressed. They (the Christians) don’t see the irony, do they? And I just love the reference to “gay-affirmative therapy”, as if any such thing was possible. It tells you all you need to know about these berks. But, remember, your own kindly GP might well be being influenced by this organization if he has evangelical Christian leanings!

Barry Duke

I have just added a video to this report that hilariously exposes the idiocy of gay-to-straight therapies.

Broga

barriejohn: my wife is a member of the Secular Medical Forum. Her gay women patients thought she was gay because she was so “sympathetic.”
They were surprised when I appeared out of the woodwork when she retired. A sad and sorry tale that normal professional behaviour is seen by some patients as “sympathetic.”

StephenJP

barriejohn: FWIW, my GP practice advertises itself as “Christian”, and has one or two little homilies up in the waiting room, along with the ads about smoking etc. To do them justice, they have never tried to persuade me to consider any spiritual remedies. Not even for my earwax.

barriejohn

Barry/Broga: It’s the attitude of these people that causes so much of the depression that gay people experience (I was suicidal at times, myself), yet they continually blame sexual orientation for this. Andrea Minichiello Williams makes her position plain here:https://youtu.be/m5Dk0CSAyrM
“Heaven and Hell depends upon it; our very Eternity depends on it”, she hectors the Synod members. You’re not going to get anywhere there!

1859

I wish I could find some ‘therapy’ to convert christians to atheists (a hose pipe in the arse for example?). Imagine how these gay-cure idiots would react – they would scream persecution! freedom of religion! Why they constantly try to deny gay people the right to be what they want, is – of course – because they are either repressed sexually themselves and/or they are terrified of the implications for their religion. As I have said many times on this site, love has nothing to do with gender – and being free to love whoever you want would be yet another of the many nails in religion’s coffin.

barriejohn

They’ve been “demonstrating” tonight:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42992286
Again, they wouldn’t see the irony of claiming that a private cinema, acting out of compassion and with regard to reason, should be compelled to show their film, while bigoted Christians should have the right to arbitrarily withhold their services from people whom they don’t happen to like.
(PS At least their actions, and strident assertions, are yet another nail in the coffin of organized religion in this country, and are likely to drive even more young people away from its deadly clutches.)

AgentCormac

@StephenJP
While they may not be in-yer-face evangelists, the GPs in your local practice are way out of line by openly promoting themselves as being aligned to a particular brand of religion.They are forbidden by General Medical Council rules to discuss or advocate any religious beliefs unless specifically asked to do so by a patient. If I were you, I’de be having a word with the GMC.https://www.gmc-uk.org/guidance/ethical_guidance/21182.asp

1859

barriejohn: Thanks for the link – I’d guess from the BBC photos outside the cinema that 90% of those protesting are over 50. As you said, these lunatic, sad-looking dinosaurs will only drive young people away from organised religion.- the sooner the better.

Terry

You see … the christians are wrong … they pray and pray and pray for the eradication of gayness … millions of them pray for the eradication of gayness … any they pray every day … but gayness still flourishes unabated … therefore God is either ok with gayness … or … and this is almost certainly the case … there is no god. In short the existence of gays is very nearly the proof that God does not exist.

Broga

1859;” 90% of those protesting are over 50.” I have just been to a Christian funeral. Apart from the immediate family everyone looked over 70 never mind 50. I had forgotten just how ridiculous the sermon could be. An aged vicar droning on about the deceased, soon to be cremated, now being with Jesus. I wondered what part of him, following cremation, was spending an eternity of bliss with Jesus. And how would he pass the time?
The young will never return to listen passively to this nonsense.

andym

We don’t know who’s funding CLC. They seem to have deep pockets, but I’m beginning to wonder how much the outcome of these cases worries them or Williams. A defeat just adds to the persecution myth-and Williams gets paid. The “victims” then get to be martyrs, so everyone gains in some way, if not financially,

tonye

I’ve never been able to comprehend the religious obsession around homosexuality. But when folk that I would consider educated (GP’s) get involved in anti-gay propaganda it’s quite saddening.
Give me science over religion any day.

Broga

tonye: Perhaps some of the obsession is the result of homosexual drives within themselves and which they cannot acknowledge.

Angela_K

I seem to remember a load of faux outraged Christians protesting and managing to get banned in some towns, Life of Brian; don’t they see the irony?

tonye

@Broga,
The irony is that they would be far happier in themselves if they came out.

andym

You also have to factor in that these Abrahamic cults are all obsessed with outbreeding the opposition, so want to control sexual behaviour and minimise non-reproductive sex.

CoastalMaineBird

I am not gay; but I really struggle to understand how being homosexual can possibly be regarded as a ‘lifestyle choice’ that people can just walk away from if they choose.
Likewise, I am not gay. And likewise, I always wondered why gay folks would have a “choice” that I myself did not have.

Ha ha. How they’d respond to unwanted heterosexual feelings is the acid test of their honestly and integrity.

Gaurav Tyagi

Henri, an excellent link about the religious Muslim morons of Boko Haram.

AgentCormac

@ Stonyground
Thanks for sharing that link – it made me chortle!

Stuart H.

Thanks BarrieJohn, thought I recognised that name Peter May from the dim and distant past. CMF and their close friends at CARE pop up every time there are government consultations into things like abortion law reform or assisted dying. By sharing information and agreeing on a common stance but insisting on speaking separately they make their loathsome views appear much more widespread amongst the medical profession. As a lot of their members are retired they’re also good at packing out GMC or BMA conferences when policy statements on such things get decided. The vast majority of working hospital docs and GPs, of course, have no time to attend such shindigs.
As I recall, one of CMF’s little schemes was encouraging fundie doctors to work in medical specialities such as gynaecology, where they could then conveniently be “unavailable” every time a woman needed an abortion . This nasty idea was unlikely to work in big city hospitals, but think of the effect in smaller hospitals where such a bigot might be the only medic qualified and available for such procedures.
Another amusing thing I remember is that when their own membership nosedived they reached out to young Muslim medical students in attempts to create little pockets of resistance to humanitarian medical practice.

1859

@ broga: ‘ I wondered what part of him, following cremation, was spending an eternity of bliss with Jesus. And how would he pass the time?’
This made me wonder that, really, there can’t be much left of Jesus, because every day during the catholic mass little bits of him are eaten – and it’s been going on for over 2000 years! Divine cannibalism! So as for an ‘eternity of bliss’ your cremated friend maybe in for a nasty shock.

StephenJP

@AgentCormac (yesterday at 11.35pm): ah, but they are punctilious about not initiating anything of the sort. Just a few fliers on the walls or in the corner of the room. Nothing that could be regarded as proselytising.
Besides, I would like to carry on being able to access their professional services when I need to!